


and in this flea our two bloods mingled be

by fvckradio



Category: NCT (Band), WAYV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Alternate Universe - Vampire, M/M, Medieval Medicine, Minor Character Death, Plague, Religion, Religious Guilt, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Temporary Character Death, Vampires, set in middle ages europe, vaguely monastic life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:40:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28271043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fvckradio/pseuds/fvckradio
Summary: In 1347, a plague begins.
Relationships: Mark Lee/Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul | Ten
Comments: 10
Kudos: 18
Collections: Kingdom Come Round One





	1. had the air been clear and pure

**Author's Note:**

> written for Kingdom Come fest, prompt #A040
> 
> thank you to my dear friends who helped me through this, especially those of you who beta-d this, as well as the mod for this fest for being so kind! 
> 
> things to note:  
>  **warnings**  
>  this fic deals with sensitive topics, including the plague, minor character deaths, temporary major character death, graphic descriptions of plague, death from the plague, etc. if anything isn't tagged that you feel should be **_please_** tell me.  
> readers may notice parallels to the current (as of jan 2021) COVID-19 pandemic. if this is sensitive for you, i suggest not reading.  
> writing this included lots of research. there are lots of footnotes, which link to proper sources where appropriate. in-text annotation links to footnotes at the bottom of the fic. this is supplemental information, translations, and other things i felt would be helpful and/or interesting. 
> 
> i hope that you will enjoy reading this fic as much as i have enjoyed writing it.  
> with love, s
> 
> (title is from [The Flea by John Donne](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46467/the-flea))

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title from [Le Jugement dou Roy de Navarre by Guillaume de Machaut](https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/palmer-machaut-thedebateseries-navarre) line 27
> 
>  **warning** for plague, minor character death, graphic description of plague symptoms
> 
> all footnotes will link to the end notes, mostly just definitions and background information that you may find interesting!

> _Ther cam a privee thief men clepeth Deeth,  
>  That in this contree al the peple sleeth,  
>  And with his spere he smoot his herte atwo,  
>  And wente his way withouten wordes mo.  
>  He hath a thousand slain this pestilence._ 1

\- Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales (1392)

**1348 - winter**

The bell tolls four and the late afternoon sun begins to creep through the room like a slinking cat. As Mark stares up at the dark ceiling of his hollow room, he takes in the sounds. The haunting chime of the church bell rings through the village. One, two, three, and then again. The echo lingers, floats through the frigid air and his window and mixes with the whipping winds of the beginnings of a cold winter storm. If he focuses, he can make out the creaking of door hinges underneath it. Cattle moo, low and frustrated, as they’re corralled towards their stables. At least, that’s what he assumes, if the sound of their feet banding against the hard, frozen ground is anything to go by. The cacophony decays with the evening air. The day is wrapping up. The village whispers to itself. 

This grim winter is not getting easier. 

As the final echoes of the bell fade, the humming begins. It starts low and quiet and far away, and with every passing moment it grows closer and closer. Mark opens his eyes. 

Pushing himself off the ground is no easy feat. His arms are boneless and weak from however long he had remained unmoving on the stone floor. Making his way to his window, he peeks over the corner, registers the sight to memory. The five men walk together down the unpaved roads, two pairs side by side, their leader holding a cross. He thinks they look silly, draped in mourning cloth and anguish. Much to his relief, this town is free of flagellants2, although he doubts they would send those types out on a housecall. He lets out a familiar sigh. The grim processional is not a promising matter. Mark knows where they are coming from. The family down by the woods had come down with the disease. 

The town had been lucky—they had been saved from much of the horror of the pestilence and they had yet to be ravished by the sickness. It was only a matter of time at this point; two had died last week, and another one just the other day. Mark hadn’t left his room since. 

It wasn’t that he was nervous, more that he had no purpose. As the priests transitioned into house visits and slowly strayed away from large masses or, more importantly to Mark, long sessions of sitting down and transcribing whatever they desired from him, Mark had had nothing to do besides lay waste in his chambers. 

He knows that he should run down to see if there was anything to be learned about the status of the young family, but the steep steps seem so daunting. The door to the monastery swings open and the chanting finally slowly dwindles down to a low murmur. Mark waits until he hears the footsteps moving into the main room before he descends. 

Racing down the stairs isn’t his best decision by any means, but Mark is tired of his tower and he needs to know what is going on. The harsh slap of his feet against the solid stones makes a thwack with every stair. Down, down, down, ten, fifteen, thirty stairs. He descends into the hall and follows the murmur through the maze until he is pushing open the chapel doors and stepping into the freezing room. 

Conversation halts as the heavy door slams behind him. Eyes cast judgment on his form as he sets foot in the hall. After a beat, many leave him be. The few eyes that linger, he ignores. 

“Surprised to see you here,” the man he steps beside snarks. Mark knows him, the young man is training to be a priest, so he laughs. No harm is meant, and Mark is alright with being the joke today. 

“What are they saying?” he asks instead of answering the unasked question. Mark’s role in the monastery is not one that they often discuss. “What have they learned?” 

A grim expression falls over his companion. Mark sighs, “so nothing good?” 

“Shame about all of them but especially a shame about the baby,” the man murmured. “They doubt they’ll make it through the night.” 

Mark feels his stomach bubble. Anxiety colors his voice as he asks the question he doesn’t feel justified in worrying over. “Are they baptized?” 

The man makes a sound of affirmation. “It’s why we went down there. Been ten days, it needed to be done3. And good thing, any longer and we may have missed it.” 

A shiver runs down Mark’s spine and he lets the conversation die there. He lets the pit in his stomach return as he shuffles through the thoughts in his head. Darkness was falling over the town as dusk rolled into night. With no daylight, there was nothing to distract him from the doomish fog surrounding him. The conversation around him moves on, switches over to what is to be done about the need for parchment and if they need to start seriously drying their own animal skins again4. That would be his job if they did, but Mark blocks them out. He blocks them out even as he is corralled towards the kitchen for dinner, remaining silent through the evening meal. Mark doesn’t speak until they are completing their evening mass and he is chanting alongside everyone else. He lets his voice go unused. 

The conversation of death is not for him. 

Mark is an academic, but he is not a philosopher; he is not a theologian. He is just a man who moved to a monastery to write. The men he knows are here for priesthood and believe ordainment is their ticket to salvation. Dedication shows itself in many ways, and while Mark may not have been a priest, he was a poet.5

Literacy had come easy for him, and a practice most often saved for those with a devotion most could only imagine having was Mark’s. His job is simple. He would learn to write and he would transcribe the things that they needed. He would help write the prayers and the songs and he would help where he could. It was simple and it kept him close to words and close to God and he was contented. 

No one could have seen death coming, no matter how much the delusional man who lived in town claimed that greed had brought them pestilence. They couldn’t afford to blame the king. All they could do was fall to their knees and beg that the Lord have mercy on their tiny town. 

Mercy was not something they were owed, however. 

Mark returned to his room, to his tower, the way he always does: alone and silent. The hush follows him down the hall and up the stairs. He rushes to shut the door in its face. His best efforts were never enough to stop the draft, and so soundlessness pervades into his very own sacred space. 

He returns to his back. Looking up to the stonework on the ceiling makes him feel calm. When he arrived, the monk who had greeted him had told him they were inhabiting one of the oldest buildings in the state. It made Mark feel comforted; this building had lived long before him and it would stand tall for centuries after him. The brickwork reminds him of his insignificance. 

The bell tolls one more time before he falls into slumber. One, two three, four five, six, he loses count as it rings and rings over their holy grounds. His eyes fall shut sometime between when the echoes stop and the crow starts. It’s fitful and restless and he knows the exhaustion starts and ends in his bones. 

In the morning, the baby is dead. The village mourns quietly. Hustle and bustle slow as they watch from their homes as a young man goes to retrieve the body. 

This is the beginning of the end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **FOOTNOTES**  
> 1\. There came a stealthy thief men call Death,/ Who slays all the people in this country,/ And with his spear he struck [the dead man's] heart in two,/ And went his way without more words./ He has slain a thousand [during] this pestilence. (Translations from the [Harvard Chaucer Page](https://chaucer.fas.harvard.edu/pages/pardoners-prologue-introduction-and-tale).) Back
> 
> 2\. Flagellants, or people who whipped themselves as punishment weren’t extremely common during the plague, but they did exist. Many of them were not encouraged however. ([Liturgical Processions](https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1248&context=hilltopreview)) Back
> 
> 3\. In the middle ages, baptism typically occurred within 10 days of the birth of a baby. Priests preferred to do them on the day of birth, but a 8-10 day window was most common. ([Medieval Prosopography](https://www.jstor.org/stable/44945861).) Back
> 
> 4\. Paper didn’t gain popularity until the 15th and 16th centuries in Europe despite already being widespread in China. Instead, scribes used parchment made from animal hides, stretched and dried. It was often made by special craftsmen, but some churches would have to make their own. ([How to Make a Medieval Manuscript](https://www.bl.uk/medieval-english-french-manuscripts/articles/how-to-make-a-medieval-manuscript#).) Back
> 
> 5\. Due to how difficult it was to produce a book in the Middle Ages, writing and creating like this became its own form of devotional work. To author something was not to be taken lightly. Back


	2. full of haze

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title from [Le Jugement dou Roy de Navarre by Guillaume de Machaut](https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/palmer-machaut-thedebateseries-navarre) line 30
> 
>  **warning** for plague, minor character death, graphic description of plague symptoms
> 
> all footnotes will link to the end notes, mostly just definitions and background information that you may find interesting!

> _Tendimus huc omnes; metam properamus ad unam. Omnia sub leges mors vocat atra suas._ 1

\- OVID, Consolatio ad Liviam

There is no funeral when Mark’s mother dies, just a man collecting bodies and another week in his room. 

**1349 - winter still**

When he comes to, newly orphaned and still alone, the world has not changed. Dark ceiling stares down at him where he lies in his bed. Things are moving as normal; masses are held, scriptures are read, letters are written. They send priests out to walk the streets every evening, and behind them come a collection of people hoping prayer will save them from supposed divine punishment. Mark sits in on the five o’clock masses, as he always has. The priests pray for them, all of them, and yet he still wonders if it is enough. Later, locked in his room, he will say his own prayer for forgiveness. It is not his place to question the work of God. 

Writing is harder, as the world keeps spinning. He copies the first book of scriptures he is given and his head spins. The words look different under his penmanship and he wishes he had ways to start over. The scriptorium2 is hollow, sacred land; Mark is this paradise’s only occupant. Walls repeat back to him what he already knows and he begs for any sort of absolution. 

He does not get one. They run out of parchment some time in the cold months he cannot distinguish and it is Mark’s duty to make more. Every day he makes his way down to the empty workroom and takes care to slowly craft this essential good for their monastery. 

Once a week, a merchant will pass through town, and Mark used to be asked to go check for parchment sales, but since the winter set in he has been locked indoors in his own self-imposed isolation. A monk goes instead. Every week it will be the same, familiar words that they are only selling luxuries nowadays, and instead they will be forced to accept hide donations from the families in town. The goods are brought in by the merchant and traded by the monks and the people. Fresh hides are contributed daily. Then, Mark will be tasked with preparing it. 

He considers the process to be his own form of ceremony. 

Entering the scriptorium each day is the same ritual. Mark prepares himself with a deep breath and a prayer before he begins. The harsh smell of limewater3 twinges his nose as he sets foot in the chamber. Mark starts each morning by checking the soaking skins. They sit in the solution for a week, and when they are ready, Mark pulls them out and gets to work. 

And thus begins his least favorite part of the observance. He pulls the skins from their dregs and lays them out. Then, he scrapes away the hair and skin. It makes him queasy, to watch as he carves off what was once a familiar coat. It gathers in piles on the floor and Mark kicks it to the side to deal with when he feels less ill. He is, of course, the only one working here anymore. He’s grateful when the skin is smooth, free of each strand that once protected it. Dropping the skin into a fresh water bath feels like a reprieve but only slightly. It will soak for the day, and Mark will begin the process of preparing another skin all over again. The fresh lamb skin is left outside for him to bring in and he hauls it down the hall into his workspace. It will sit in lime for a ten days before he will have to scrape it, just like the others.

When he finishes that task, he returns to the next. Stretching skin is not enjoyable, but Mark must twist the nobs to make the parchment. He turns them until they are unable to turn anymore and then he begins scraping. His lunellum4 feels heavy in his hand as he drags it against the dried hide. He works carefully and slowly, each stroke deliberate and calculated. Each hide will need several days, both to dry and to reach their perfect density, so Mark can afford to take his time. 

It's what comes after that he enjoys. Taking the parchment down from the racks feels like releasing the tension from his own body. He sighs as he releases the clips, allows his shoulders to fall as he collects it in his arms. Rubbing pumice powder until it’s smooth is like smoothing over himself. His misgivings flake off of him like the imperfections of his parchment until he is something desirable. He dusts the surface, brushes it until it will take ink and then he sits back and looks at his handiwork. 

It is a slow service, but it is his. 

Cutting the skin into sheets is when he is most unsteady. Mark’s knife digs into the material and he begs for forgiveness before he carves his pages. He measures them and piles them to the side. Now they are primed and woven together. Another book for careful scripture.

Mark yearns for the day he can take ink to the smooth fruits of his labor. Longs for the moment his pen5 dipped in rich pigment would draw across the sheepskin. The illuminating paints6 long after him as Mark shuffles around the large room. He scores each page, prepares it for written lines and then lays it aside. Writing is now work for another day. 

The week he makes vellum7 is a week he cherishes above all. The smooth feeling of calf skin under his fingers memorializes itself in his memory and he does not admit to it, but he’s crestfallen to sell it to the merchant. The money is good though, and it can allow them to feed the town for a little longer, so Mark kneels alone in the chapel and begs for forgiveness for his sin. He kneels on the hard floor in front of the priest and repeats his confession. He expects reckoning, but he is only given a few Hail Marys, and a week ringing the bell. 

He does not confess that every day feels the same. On his knees, he refuses to admit to the sin of complacency. Monotony is not something Mark wants to succumb to and he can feel himself fading. Day after day, scraping skin just to leave his solitary chamber for a liturgy of prayers. 

The only solace he gets is going back to his room. Step by step he returns to his chambers. The carefully crafted stone walls remind him of his place, and so he counts them the way he counts strokes down a sheepskin. This building will outlive him. His parchment will outlive him.

Mark is decaying. 

He kisses the cold stone ground and begs for forgiveness. On his knees, he prays for any type of deliverance. 

He is not sure he will get it. 

**1349 - spring**

The spring arrives as it always does, but it is not the same. The smell of fresh blooms is covered by the sickening scent of decomposing bodies. It twists in Mark’s nostrils like a disgusting perfume and he wishes there was a way to plug his nose of it. 

The village is quieter than it should be. Somber. Unforgiving. They have lost too many to this pestilence and they will just lose more. Locked in his tower, Mark can do nothing but watch and wait and pray. It is exactly as he expects it to be, pacing back and forth across the floor. In the pit of his stomach, there is a creeping feeling that he should be more careful, but he wants to be careless. If Mark was less concerned with the opinions of the clergy, he would be more than happy to deliver house calls to those poor forgotten souls.

This is the way Mark begins to understand the fall. He sees priest after priest drop their heads and beg for forgiveness, sees them pray in front of crowds of broken families, but he never sees them pray for those who have gotten them into this situation. In his room, alone, Mark prays for divine intervention. 

It is in the spring that Mark finds God.

It is in the spring that a doctor arrives. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **FOOTNOTES**  
> 1\. We are all bound thither; we are hastening to the same common goal. Black death calls all things under the sway of its laws. (Translations from [Loeb Classical Library](https://www.loebclassics.com/view/ovid-poem_consolation/1929/pb_LCL232.325.xml?readMode=recto).) Back
> 
> 2\. Scriptorium comes from Latin and means “place for writing”. Medieval monasteries would have Scriptoriums where scribes would create each part of the manuscript. Working on an entire manuscript alone was very uncommon ([Scriptorium: the term and its history](https://journals.openedition.org/perspective/4401).) Back
> 
> 3\. Limewater is a solution of calcium hydroxide dissolved in water and was used to break down the hairs on animal skins. It’s described as having an “earthy smell” and has many uses besides it’s medieval use in parchment making ([Limewater](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limewater).) Back
> 
> 4\. A lunellum is a curved knife used by parchment makers to scrape parchment to the correct thickness ([Cornell University Library Conservation](https://blogs.cornell.edu/culconservation/2015/04/03/parchment-making/#:~:text=Parchment%20is%20made%20by%20soaking,rearranged%2C%20but%20not%20chemically%20altered.).) Back
> 
> 5\. Pen refers to a quill: a bird feather soaked in water, dried and hardened with hot sand. Pens as we know them were invented in 1822, and the ball point was invented in 1943 ([A Brief History Of Pens](https://medium.com/history-of-yesterday/a-brief-history-of-pens-7f6666d4446d).) Back
> 
> 6\. Colored pigments, paint, and gilding or golf leaf, were used to decorate manuscripts with fancy lettering as well as pictures and other illustrations ([How to make a medieval manuscript](https://www.bl.uk/medieval-english-french-manuscripts/articles/how-to-make-a-medieval-manuscript).) Back
> 
> 7\. Vellum is specifically parchment made out of calf hide, or more generally, the highest quality of parchment. It was significantly more valuable and of higher quality than other parchments. Vellum is not a term that is used much anymore, due to the fact that it is very difficult to identify what animal skins were used to make parchment without a microscope. Back
> 
> If for some reason, you would like to learn even more about the parchment making process, [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuNfdHNTv9o&ab_channel=GettyMuseum) by Getty Museum was incredibly helpful and shows every step of the laborious process!

**Author's Note:**

> [twitter](https://twitter.com/realitysuh)


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